Minneapolis mayor Jacob Frey says Somali entrepreneurs are being targeted because they are so awesome

THE DAILY BS: HOW MUCH CAN YOU HANDLE?

SPARE ME THE BS (I’ve got things to do).

Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey told a Somali networking audience that Somalis are being targeted because they are future CEOs and entrepreneurs.
The video circulated Tuesday, triggering a wave of sarcastic X responses about the mayor’s political flattery.
Critics quickly brought up Minnesota’s $250 million Feeding Our Future fraud scandal, including the conviction of a former Minneapolis mayoral aide.

LAY IT ON ME (I’ve got time).

Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey has discovered the secret reason people are supposedly targeting Minnesota’s Somali community.

They’re terrified of all those future CEOs.

During remarks at a Somali networking event, the Democratic mayor delivered a particularly enthusiastic explanation of why he believes the community faces hostility.

“They come after Somalis because you’re future CEOs and entrepreneurs,” Frey told the audience.

He went on to suggest that many had already achieved those ambitions.

That’s quite a motivational speech. Apparently Minneapolis has become such an economic powerhouse that the rest of America is trembling at the prospect of its next generation of corporate executives.

Unfortunately for Frey, the internet had a few thoughts about his theory.

The video circulated Tuesday, and the responses featured in a Twitchy roundup were considerably less impressed than the mayor’s audience.

“Every time this guy opens his mouth this kind of absurd BS comes out,” wrote X user James, adding, “He lives in a fantasy world.”

Conservative commentator Jeremy Carl offered a broader assessment of Democratic political performances: “Democrat politicians lie as easily as they breathe.”

But the conversation really got interesting when users began asking which particular entrepreneurial achievements Frey had in mind.

Minnesota, after all, is still dealing with one of the biggest pandemic fraud scandals in American history.

The Feeding Our Future operation stole approximately $250 million from a federally funded program intended to feed needy children. Federal prosecutors have secured numerous convictions, including against operators who reported serving astonishing numbers of meals that investigators determined were fraudulent.

And here’s a detail that makes the mayor’s latest entrepreneurial pep talk especially awkward: A former Minneapolis mayoral aide was among those who pleaded guilty in the scandal.

That doesn’t make legitimate Somali-American business owners responsible for the crimes of particular defendants. But it certainly gives the mayor’s critics some rather obvious material to work with.

Commentator David Strom responded with a pointed observation:

“Feeding Our Future was certainly entrepreneurial.”

Strom then cited the approximately $250 million stolen and the extraordinary meal counts reported by some participants in the scheme.

Another X user, Nicole, asked: “Entrepreneurship? Like creating fake daycare centers and defrauding the government?”

Not exactly the business-school success stories Frey appeared to have in mind.

Others remembered the mayor’s previous attempts to connect with Minneapolis’s Somali community, including a viral video of Frey struggling through a discussion of Somali food.

“He did a decent job stifling the laugh,” the End Wokeness account observed while sharing a clip of an earlier appearance.

And one commenter summed up the mayor’s latest performance with a short assessment: “Oh god, this guys fake virtue signaling is epic.”

Frey has repeatedly defended Minneapolis’s Somali residents against immigration enforcement measures and criticism from the Trump administration. He has described the community as part of the city’s family and praised its contributions to local business and culture.

There are certainly successful Somali-American entrepreneurs in Minnesota. Nobody needed a mayoral proclamation to establish that.

But Frey’s sweeping suggestion that hostility toward Somali residents is motivated by fear of their future business success was practically tailor-made for the sarcastic side of X.

And the response demonstrated something politicians occasionally forget: When your state is still digging through the wreckage of a quarter-billion-dollar fraud scandal, grand speeches about entrepreneurship are going to attract some very specific questions.